ASTHENOA

[capemods]

WHO: The imPorts trapped in a video game.
WHERE: The virtual world of Asthenoa.
WHEN: 10AM August 26th to 11PM August 31st.
WARNINGS: Violence and fighting. Alert me of anything else for updates.
SUMMARY: A comedy of errors: imPorts are trapped in a Vulcanus-made video game.
FORMAT: As you like it.



Asthenoa is a land set on lush rolling hills under a bright blue sky eternally streaked with clouds. The only celestial variance comes during the nightly setting, where an eternally yellow full moon partially hides behind those clouds. The people of Asthenoa may be human, or elven, or dwarven, or they may have animalistic features, but none of that is of great social concern. Asthenoa has always been this way. The heart of the land is a medieval town set upon one of the highest hills, and the middle of that town sits a majestic stone castle. The busiest part of the town is the center, which hosts the marketplace. There you can buy necessities, or meet the blacksmith and other artisans at their working studios. Beyond the artisanal studios are the taverns and the inns.

Beyond the cheerier inns is a place called The Shriveled Shrike. If you head to the second floor and knock on the third room door thrice and rub your knee against the handle once, it will magically open and expose to you a staircase. People of the Rogue class know this inherently.

The staircase is five flights long. It leads to a black market in a mile long, mile wide underground bunker, where gambling and other darker magicks are indulged. You might meet a necromancer or three. You might run into trouble.

If you were to step out beyond the town, you would have to cross a moat via the drawbridge. It’s always closed up at nighttime, you can only pass during the day.

Beyond the moat (where serpents might swim) is a hilly pasture. Beyond the pasture is an enchanted forest. Strange things happen in these gnarled woods – this is where mystical creatures lurk. Acres of dark wood house sparkling lights and floating orbs and very unusual flora. The fauna includes many mythical beings, including centaurs and fairies and griffins. There could be even more hidden within secret caves or pools of darkening water.

You feel the need to venture past this alluring wood. You feel it deeply.

Comments

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[heal_or_execute]

Upon arrival in the new world, Mordin's first thought was that last month's Evoker mishap had somehow brought back the Shadows. Once more, he was wearing black and white robes and gripping a staff. Once more, he was without his pistol or omni-tool. He had looked around for signs he was once more in Cyd Sherman's subconscious.

It had quickly become clear his initial deduction was unfounded. This world was little like the Labyrinth of Codex. Curious but wary, Mordin had set out to explore, observing his surroundings and questioning inhabitants. His 'conversations' were his first sign that something was very off about this place. All the people here only seemed to have a few generic lines to offer in response to any approach, like they were minimally-programmed virtual intelligence's.

Also mysterious was the pull Mordin felt toward the forest. His desire to know outweighed his suspicions of a trap, and eventually the Professor allowed his feet to carry him beneath the trees. As the foliage grew thicker and the surroundings darker, Mordin made toward a cluster of lights he could see through the branches. Then he realized the lights were making for him.

Floating, glowing orbs bobbed toward him and began to circle his head, never coming closer or going further than two metres away. They whispered to him in words he could not understand, and sometimes they made a whistle that touched his spine with something cold.

Mordin stepped away. The orbs stayed with him, continuing to circle. "Problematic," he said.

[enigmaestro]

"I think they rather like you."

It was a dry observation, one born from a man speaking out of the shadows. Edward had made his way deeper into the forest, still fumbling with any direction outside the general compulsion he felt to keeping moving. Needless to say, his state of mood hardly merited good manners.

"Have you tried hugging one? Some beings tend to shy from physical affection," he said, as he leaned on his mage staff. Not very helpful advice, and he very much enjoyed that fact.

[heal_or_execute]

Surprised, Mordin turned to peer into the shadows. He wasn't able to see much, on account of there being a bunch of lights orbiting at eye level that were really messing up his vision. He recognized the voice though- that of a prominent public figure in City politics and the ImPort community alike.

"Deputy Mayor Nygma," he said. "Wasn't expecting to see you here. Granted, wasn't expecting to be here either-"

Mordin broke off his patter, looking annoyed as one of the orbs whistled by his face. "Objects frustrating. Hard to concentrate. No intention of initiating physical contact- don't think they're beings in conventional sense. Maybe probes or drones of some sort."

The Professor's worldview didn't really adapt all that well to a fantasy world. The orbs continued their circling and their whispering, to Mordin's mounting aggravation.

[enigmaestro]

"Oh dear. They didn't seem to like that much, did they?" Edward, advancing from the shadows, wore his mage's robes and a cold smirk. While City Hall more intimately knew of his sadistic side (by merit of proximity, of course, and who could blame him? Every man had his vice), Edward was usually more capable of keeping his crueler amusement restrained.

But he was distressed, in a darkened wood. And hungry. And it would've been nice to smuggle in one last shower before shuttering off to some glorified renaissance festival.

"Might they be using your own eyes as mirrors? Vanity, tsk. Or -- I wonder -- we don't know how these things copulate, do we? Perhaps they are probing you."

His expressive eyebrow waggle was possibly lost in the darkness of the wood.

[heal_or_execute]

Mordin recoiled at the thought of Edward's... theory. Of course, when he took two steps back, the orbs stayed right with him. Still whispering.

"Very low probability of compatible reproduction between Salarian DNA and... these," he said, making a mental note to find out if the City's Deputy Mayor was always this helpful. "Need to warn them off. Don't want to attack them- not actually hostile. Distraction better. See if they'll pay attention to something else."

He blinked as the lights passed in front of his eyes once more. Then he focused on Eddie. Eddie now in the open, and apparently dressed very similarly to Mordin. The Professor 'hm'd to himself and started walking toward him. The orbs followed.

"Mister Nygma, please hold still. Might need assistance in small experiment."

[enigmaestro]

Edward narrowed his eyes, suspicion clouding his features. The assertive movement demonstrated by Mordin, the sudden turn in focus, well, it added up to an uncomfortable calculation. Edward began taking careful steps backwards, slowly escaping the oncoming entourage.

"Oh no, no. You're not about to shove off your fangirls -- or boys, as they may be -- onto me. I've had enough of that coming from raccoons, no less," he said with a warding wave of his individualized mage staff. But as Mordin drew closer in proximity, a few of the more adventurous orbs started to include Eddie in their orbit.

Only when one veered dangerously close to up his nose, did Eddie take offense. He whacked out his staff, warding away the advances, but the orbs had significant numbers (comparatively). Eddie's temper boiled, and he slammed his staff into one hovering by his left shoulder.

The orb froze, perhaps dazed, and sizzled into a variety of psychedelic colors, red and blue and purple, before smoldering to a bright yellow --

-- and dislodging from its presumed orifice a small bag that dropped to the floor with a jingle.

Eddie looked to the ground, looked to Mordin, looked to the relieved orb. Looked back to Mordin.

"Ah, right, yes, as if that makes any sense. Really now." He said as he bent over, examining what appeared to be a cloth bag. He took it up in hand, pulling the purse-string open for a thorough examination.

It was a bag of gold.

Gold excreted from a floating orb seemingly infatuated with an alien.

"I don't really like magic."

Needless to say, he was distracted long enough for Mordin to enact whatever small experiment he might have had in mind.

[heal_or_execute]

In other circumstances, Mordin might have been all too happy to commiserate with Eddie about the raccoon thing and other horrors associated with one April Ludgate. He had stories to tell. Stories involving karaoke.

In these circumstances though, Mordin was indeed taking advantage of Eddie's distraction to wave his fanboys/girls/fanorbs away from his head and into new orbits around Eddie's. As more of them took up new residence in the area adjacent to Edward's skull, Mordin was able to better observe this phenomenon without being its epicenter. He saw the individual the Deputy Mayor had just bludgeoned and possibly robbed float off back into the enchanted forest, seemingly none the worse for the experience. If anything, the sphere now had a bit of a lively bob in its flight.

"Intriguing," he whispered. "Carrying cargo- reinforces probe theory. May be intended to deliver these materials for some reason. Will attempt examination."

In this context, 'examination' meant Mordin raising his staff and, following in the footsteps of Salarians from time immemorial, poking an unknown and possibly dangerous object to see what it would do. He poked it once, twice, three times. The orb froze, flared into the same rapid cycle of bright colours, blazed yellow, and dropped another bag.

Mordin smiled. "Appear to be making progress."

[latrodectus]

Natasha was by nature driven to explore, and to disappear. The forest, with its many shadowed fingers, was a good place to do that. Scout, re-evaluate. That was the plan.

Until she was attacked by what seemed to be a singing shrubbery. Natasha was a practiced, steady person— she could breathe through just about anything and keep a straight face. But alone then, with no one watching, she let herself say, "Oh, wonderful."

And then she ran away from the musical killer plant. Some distance from where she'd started running Natasha encountered Mordin, and his circling globes of light. There's a part of her that says she should keep running, that distractions in her path were assets. And something, deeper and foreign, that told her to keep running, no matter what. But Natasha is heroic, when people need her to be.

:"Hail and warning, friend," she said, "there is a beast that tracks me."

The globes of light have not entranced her, yet, distracted as she was. But perhaps soon that would change.

[heal_or_execute]

"Greetings," Mordin replied, blinking as he tried to perceive his new compatriot past the regularly-blinding flashes of light which kept passing before his eyes as the orbs circled. He was getting the hang of timing his blinks so that his eyes were only open while their vision was clear. "Offer warning in return: these lights-" he indicated his current 'groupies'- "don't appear dangerous, but have tendency toward attachment."

He looked past her, back among the trees she had emerged from, trying to spot the danger. "Can offer assistance, fight off your attacker. Unless it's too strong. Better to flee, in that case."

[latrodectus]

"It's a plant." She feels sort of sheepish. The magic in this place wants her to draw foes, not fight them upfront. But Natasha knows how to stand in the light, too.

"I think I can kill it, if you help me." Natasha didn't think she needed the help, but it was better not to be cocky. And then terrible sharp petals were shooting at her like knives. She dodged, and they stuck out from the nearest tree, instead of her abdomen. "It's getting closer. Maybe those lights of yours can blind it."

[heal_or_execute]

"Unlikely. Can't control them," Mordin called as he got moving, registering that the attacker- a plant?- had projectile weapons and significant accuracy. He got behind the nearest tree, silently resenting the way the orbs stayed right with him. They were lighting up his position for anyone or any thing that cared to target him.

"Have fire attack. Can incinerate enemy," he said. He peeked around the tree trunk, trying to spot the hostile plant among the less ambulatory foliage of the forest. "Need help locating. Orbs are interfering with vision!" As long as the bizarre spheres kept circling Mordin's head, it was going to be awfully hard to aim a decent fireball.